Big Day Out
Elizabeth, TICH's librarian, asks if I'd like to visit the Kenya National Library in Kisumu. You bet! So we requisition a TICH vehicle to take us to the library across town and to the new Nakumatt on Nairobi Road, which had its grand opening yesterday. This Nakumatt has a built-in mall with an optician, a car parts store, mobile phone centers and a furniture store. Upstairs, they're completing construction on a cinema and food court. To reach the Nakumatt, we pass wooden street stalls where ladies sell their backyard fruit and second-hand clothes. Small, barefoot children walk in the dirt yards of cement stores sitting close to the road.
We pull up to the gate at the Nakumatt, leaving behind the shoeless and the jobless, and are allowed into the parking lot by the security guards. Before going into the Nakumatt, we walk the mall looking at the other stores. Many are still being outfitted. Barclay's has a branch in progress. The Nakumatt is two levels and vast, selling everything from meat and produce to chandeliers and clothes washers. They have a “bakery” area and a wine section with fashionable walls made of honey-colored, polished wood. There's even cold cheese!! I am so carried away by the abundance I must buy some Victoria Queen Cakes and an avocado (only 10 bob).
Elizabeth and I linger in the garden section, contemplating the best planters for growing African violets. It feels as though I am back in the U.S.A., at a Super Wal-Mart, especially with Eddie Vedder's voice coming over the sound system, followed by Madonna's “Papa Don't Preach.” I look longingly at a 17 inch JVC color TV for 6,995 Kshs., or about $88 USD. But didn't I come to Africa to escape materialism and to, instead, dive into endeavours that really matter? Well....yes. But a TV means international news and educational programming (I promise not to watch the Mexican soap opera with English sub-titles shown every Saturday and Sunday night).
We pull ourselves away from the air-conditioned super store and enter the library. Elizabeth ran this library years ago, so several people know her as we enter. She discusses membership cards and their new anti-theft system while I walk the stacks, dreaming of my own library card. John, our TICH driver, and Elisa, our IT guy, look about as well. Elisa needed a ride into town to buy an adaptor. Immediately, I see books to check out; a collection of E.M. Forster novels (“Where Angels Fear to Tread,” “A Room with a View,” and “Howard's End”), actress Carrie Fisher's novel, “Surrender the Pink,” and Rachel Carson's “Silent Spring,” the African edition with a prologue about Africa's environmental issues. There's a whole shelf on Hemingway, which might be tempting once I've read everything else. Most of the books are old, just like TICH's. Their spines are tattered beyond reading, their covers cracked and dingy. But I love them, every one! German, Canadian and Italian books are well-represented.
Hoping there's time, I rush to the front desk and ask to get a library card. Once it's determined I'm a resident, the woman escorts me to a small room where a very tall man asks me to sit. I tell him I'd like a library card and show him my Kenya Identification card, which affords me all the rights of a resident (including admission to national parks for a ridiculously low rate compared to what tourists have to pay). He reads and reads and reads my ID card, then tells me I'll have to leave it behind when I check out books. “But I've been told to carry that card at all times, in case the police stop me on the street.” Elizabeth walks up and explains to him that I live here and am a staff member at TICH. “Then you can leave your passport when you check out books,” he says. This scares me. But Elizabeth is aware he thinks all white people are tourist, and, yes, tourists are required by Kenya to leave behind their passports when they check out books. He gives me the card registration form, asking me to have TICH complete the back side. Once I've completed the front, I can get the card. And the library is open on Saturday!! All day Saturday!!! (Except for lunch.)
Elizabeth and I climb into the back of the vehicle and we head out on dirt roads, holding on to the overhead bar so we won't land in the floor. But I hardly notice the bumps. There's a library with a well-stocked philosophy section. I'm going to get a card. And they're open all day Saturday!
We pull up to the gate at the Nakumatt, leaving behind the shoeless and the jobless, and are allowed into the parking lot by the security guards. Before going into the Nakumatt, we walk the mall looking at the other stores. Many are still being outfitted. Barclay's has a branch in progress. The Nakumatt is two levels and vast, selling everything from meat and produce to chandeliers and clothes washers. They have a “bakery” area and a wine section with fashionable walls made of honey-colored, polished wood. There's even cold cheese!! I am so carried away by the abundance I must buy some Victoria Queen Cakes and an avocado (only 10 bob).
Elizabeth and I linger in the garden section, contemplating the best planters for growing African violets. It feels as though I am back in the U.S.A., at a Super Wal-Mart, especially with Eddie Vedder's voice coming over the sound system, followed by Madonna's “Papa Don't Preach.” I look longingly at a 17 inch JVC color TV for 6,995 Kshs., or about $88 USD. But didn't I come to Africa to escape materialism and to, instead, dive into endeavours that really matter? Well....yes. But a TV means international news and educational programming (I promise not to watch the Mexican soap opera with English sub-titles shown every Saturday and Sunday night).
We pull ourselves away from the air-conditioned super store and enter the library. Elizabeth ran this library years ago, so several people know her as we enter. She discusses membership cards and their new anti-theft system while I walk the stacks, dreaming of my own library card. John, our TICH driver, and Elisa, our IT guy, look about as well. Elisa needed a ride into town to buy an adaptor. Immediately, I see books to check out; a collection of E.M. Forster novels (“Where Angels Fear to Tread,” “A Room with a View,” and “Howard's End”), actress Carrie Fisher's novel, “Surrender the Pink,” and Rachel Carson's “Silent Spring,” the African edition with a prologue about Africa's environmental issues. There's a whole shelf on Hemingway, which might be tempting once I've read everything else. Most of the books are old, just like TICH's. Their spines are tattered beyond reading, their covers cracked and dingy. But I love them, every one! German, Canadian and Italian books are well-represented.
Hoping there's time, I rush to the front desk and ask to get a library card. Once it's determined I'm a resident, the woman escorts me to a small room where a very tall man asks me to sit. I tell him I'd like a library card and show him my Kenya Identification card, which affords me all the rights of a resident (including admission to national parks for a ridiculously low rate compared to what tourists have to pay). He reads and reads and reads my ID card, then tells me I'll have to leave it behind when I check out books. “But I've been told to carry that card at all times, in case the police stop me on the street.” Elizabeth walks up and explains to him that I live here and am a staff member at TICH. “Then you can leave your passport when you check out books,” he says. This scares me. But Elizabeth is aware he thinks all white people are tourist, and, yes, tourists are required by Kenya to leave behind their passports when they check out books. He gives me the card registration form, asking me to have TICH complete the back side. Once I've completed the front, I can get the card. And the library is open on Saturday!! All day Saturday!!! (Except for lunch.)
Elizabeth and I climb into the back of the vehicle and we head out on dirt roads, holding on to the overhead bar so we won't land in the floor. But I hardly notice the bumps. There's a library with a well-stocked philosophy section. I'm going to get a card. And they're open all day Saturday!
posted by Cindi at 10:12 PM
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